CNN video problematic

Shifting in a lurching way from serious international conflict to domestic internet annoyances, I have to complain about CNN video.

They deploy an HD-shaped window on their site then proceed to STRETCH content that has a Standard Definition aspect ratio (4:3) to the 16:9 shape of their window.

I have complained about televisions doing this, but this is a web site... there is absolutely no excuse for this kind of stupidity in visual rendering.

I believe it calls their journalistic integrity into question. It would be offensive if they animated mustaches onto faces or digitally altered images to include animated digital hats or logos. What they actually do is distort every single pixel of the image, stretching it out of reality.

Here is a captured image from their site:



Here is my digitally corrected version, restoring the real inherent aspect ratio of the video content:



It's clear that the corrected image is far more true to life and real than the stretched one. This lovely woman's face is stretched to pancakoid by CNN's flawed video deployment.

Try opening those two images into separate browser windows to their native resolutions and comparing the look and sizing of them.

I doubt they do it on purpose, it's just that they don't care enough to deliver the best. They are just too lazy to care.

That is a shame, since their business is producing video content and deploying it!

I hope they "find the side bars" for their non HD content and stop stretching the truth.

=sw